Twilight of Aurelis
by Mark of the Asphodel
Summary: After all they sacrificed for peace, one maniac plunged the continent back into war. Wolfguard POV. FE3.


**Twilight of Aurelis**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Fire Emblem**_** or any of its characters.**

**Warnings: Eh, spoilery for FE3 ****aka**_** Monshou no Nazo**_**. Implied character death. **

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Men of the plains have trouble in the mountains. It takes three days for Roshea to adjust to the thin air of Adria Pass, three days of aches and lightheadedness that the healers cannot relieve. He does his duties to the best of his abilities, but he knows he is not acting at his full potential, and so he avoids his friends lest he shame himself in their eyes. They do not suffer as severely from the heights, and he decides that his relative youth is the cause of his weakness. With more training, more discipline, he will not be so indisposed. Roshea looks forward to the day when he can stand as tall as his captain in the face of all conditions; in the meantime, he prays for his head to clear.

These hostile mountains are the very roof of the continent, and the Wolfguard have made their camp upon the sacred slopes of Adria Peak. It is the guardian of Archanea, a great gray paladin of a mountain whose granite shoulders stand above the summits of its lesser companions. But this defender has a flaw, a narrow pass that, if breached by an enemy, allows one to be within a day's ride of the capital. It is beautiful, though, and even in his time of sickness, Roshea admires its grandeur. The snows upon the Peak take on a different character with every hour of the day-- sparkling white, soft and luminous blue, a dusky gray-violet. In fleeting moments of sunrise or sunset, Roshea sees pearly pinks and vivid orange. He would not trade places with the few who live in these mountains, but he admits their environs inspire awe; they live closer to the gods, perhaps, than the plains-dwellers of Aurelis.

On the fourth day, Roshea deems himself fit company again. The captain acknowledges his presence at breakfast with a few words.

"Good to have you with us," says Captain Wolf, and while his expression does not change, one eye narrows slightly as he regards Roshea. The flicker in his eye is the equivalent of a wink and a smile from a more demonstrative man, and Roshea knows his presence has been missed.

"I do not want to disappoint you, sir." Roshea speaks with a fervor that is viewed by some as unmanly, but if his sincere heart makes him the butt of his comrades' jokes, he knows that his sincerity, his faith, is what he brings to the battle as his own peculiar gift. The Captain simply nods an acknowledgment; he does not expect Roshea to disappoint.

The other men are less restrained; Vyland greets him with an affectionate thump on the back, and the rest engage in some good-natured teasing of "Little Rosey." Roshea takes it in stride and applies himself to the first breakfast he's truly enjoyed since their arrival at the Pass.

"You haven't missed much," Vyland says. "This place isn't exactly Port Warren."

The Gateway of the Gods, as some still call Adria Pass, is as far from the Port of Joy as two places can be in spirit. Roshea, all of fifteen at the time of his first visit to the notorious seaside city, still feels a tinge of shame over some of the "diversions" he witnessed there. His self-appointed tour guide on that occasion, a young mercenary, had later become entangled romantically with a married woman, had disappeared without a trace, and is probably lying somewhere in the depths of the harbor. Roshea thinks that he will take thin air and isolation over sea breezes and such dubious entertainment.

The day is as brief as it is uneventful; it is the turning of the year, and the pale sun takes but a short journey across the sky. Roshea attends to his prayers, his equipment, and to his destrier, who has been a little neglected in the last few days. Veillantif is restless, as he does not enjoy long stays in camp, and so Roshea makes amends to his steed by taking a brief ride in the direction of Pales. Veillantif has longed for some proper exercise, and the ride is a test of Roshea's own constitution. They go as far as the nearest lookout point over Pales, for the capital is nestled at the base of the mountains, so near in space and yet seemingly the furthest place imaginable from this ridge of ancient stone that spans the continent. From the mountains the Holy City looks so fragile, as though a man could smash it to pieces with one blow of his fist. In that delicate shell of marble are the lives he is sworn to protect: the Emperor in grave majesty upon his throne, the gentle Empress in her chambers. Roshea offers an extra prayer for the city; so near to the Gateway of the Gods, spirits may be close at hand to hear him.

It is twilight when Roshea and Veillantif come back to camp, as sundown in its beauty has caught them unaware. There is no trouble on their arrival, though; the captain has declared it a free night, and camp protocol is relaxed for all but those on guard duty. The Wolfguard do not receive such indulgent treatment often, but most of their missions don't involve waiting an indefinite time in a remote place for an enemy who may not show himself. After seeing his steed is in comfort for the evening, Roshea joins his friends by the fire. Vyland hands him a bowl of stew, then passes along a jug of apple brandy. Roshea does not believe a knight should intoxicate himself before battle, but there is no indication of a battle tomorrow. The brandy warms him a little, and besides that, it is a taste of home, a bottled-up memory of the orchards and pastures of Aurelis. He wonders what the people of this region live upon-- game and berries, presumably. Then again, with the great capital so close, supplies should be easy for the mountain-dwellers to procure. The Wolfguard have no fears of running low on provisions; if need be, they can simply send a man down to Pales to restock.

"What's that?" Vyland's ears are uncommonly keen, and he notices the sound of a large animal approaching the camp long before Roshea can hear it. The sentries are ready to spear the invader if necessary, but the lone rider proves to be not a foreign soldier, but a herald in the Imperial colors. Roshea feels a pang of dread at his approach. Empress Nyna has not been well, not for many months, and Roshea fears this messenger may bring grave news from the palace. He watches Captain Wolf closely when the herald rushes up to him. The captain's face shows nothing as he listens to the report; he bids the herald to sit with them and take refreshment, then takes his own place by the fire. The captain pulls a knife from his belt and begins to whittle a stray stick of wood.

"Gra fell to the rebels," the captain says. The wood shavings fall steadily from the blade of his knife to form a pile on the ground as he pares the stick away to nothingness.

Strange, Roshea thinks, how it is possible to feel shock without really being surprised. The defenses of Gra were nothing compared to the fearsome might of the Altean-Macedonian alliance. Green recruits facing veterans of the last war... the outcome was a foregone conclusion. Gra could only have been what it was, an obstacle to slow the rebels briefly in their push toward the capital. The Emperor has sent them to Adria Pass for this very reason. And yet, the inevitability of the battle does not comfort Roshea, not when he knows that he and his comrades are now all that stand between the rebels and the Holy City.

"Expect them in two days' time," Captain Wolf says as he puts away his knife. All that remains of the stick are a heap of shavings and a sweet aroma in the air that is soon smothered by the scent of the fire. "We'll hold position until then."

The men of the Wolfguard do not appear bothered by the news; the majority of them are bored by their mission, bored by the mountains and its sleepy small villages. The majesty of Adria Peak does not inspire them. As they disperse for the night, Roshea seeks out Captain Wolf's first lieutenant, who showed a grim face when the captain told them the fate of Gra. Roshea feels that Sedgar must share his own discomfort with the latest news.

"He'll lose half his army trying to get over the mountains," Sedgar says of the disgraced prince who has made himself the centerpiece of the rebellion. "No general in the history of Archanea has managed to conquer Adria Pass. And that doesn't stop him."

Roshea thinks of the good judgment of the Emperor, who has anticipated such an unorthodox move from his opponent. The Emperor and the Prince of Altea had a good working relationship, a friendship even, before this inexplicable rebellion, and this history must give the Emperor some insight into his unpredictable enemy. At times Roshea has wished that Emperor Hardin could have remained with them in the field, that the burden of state did not keep the Emperor chained to the great throne at Pales. But the Emperor has his place and his duty, and Roshea, who knows he is no general and may never be, has his own duty to carry out the Emperor's will. It is _not_ Roshea's place to second-guess the rebel commander, which is just as well, because he can't begin to puzzle it out.

He and Sedgar maintain a watch over the Pass, on the lookout for the glimmer of enemy torches in the profound blackness below them.

"They say he marches at night, stages battles in the rain," Sedgar says, his voice low so as to not disturb their sleeping comrades. "Violates all the rules of proper combat."

Roshea makes a wordless sound of agreement.

"That damned kid." Sedgar's breath condenses into swirls of fog. "Altea's not enough for him, so he has to take the whole world. What's he going to do with it all?"

"I don't know," Roshea says. It's all he _can_ say. It's senseless to him-- the rebellion, the ruin of Grust, the conquest of Gra, the bizarre feints and disappearances of the rebel army, and the utter refusal to _stop_ no matter the stakes. What goes on in the mind of a prince who takes up arms against his sovereign lord, yet leaves his own vassals undefended? The whole venture seems mad to Roshea, and a part of him still refuses to believe the facts laid before him. It simply does not make sense. The Prince Marth of Roshea's memories is a kind and just person, an eager student of Hardin's, and in some ways very like the Emperor. Emperor Hardin had sensed that kinship, and had given guidance to the young prince as he matured into a true leader. Roshea can only imagine the disappointment that Hardin must feel now in his protégé.

"After all we fought through, one maniac plunges the world back into war," Sedgar continues.

Roshea stares up at the sky, hoping the beauty around him will soothe the nagging feeling of hopelessness in his breast. Low fibrous clouds scrape the peaks around them, but through one clear patch to the south Roshea can see a single star that sparkles with the brilliance of Empress Nyna's diamonds. He thinks he remembers that same star from three years before, when it shone high above the citadel of Macedon, but he has forgotten its name.

"Get some sleep, Roshea. There's no need for both of us to keep watch," says Sedgar. "If someone were coming, we'd see them from miles away...." His voice fades out, and they both gaze at the sable void that lies beyond the Pass.

Roshea obeys the lieutenant and retires to his tent. His body is tired, his mind riddled with anxiety. He tries to clear his mind; he reflects on his duties to his country and his sovereign in hopes of achieving the serene state a knight should feel on the eve of battle. He exists to serve, and he must be willing to give his life in that service if it is necessary. Yet fear of death is not what bothers him, not exactly; Roshea decides that he must simply be afraid of failure, afraid of disgracing himself and of failing his captain and the Emperor. He says a prayer for the Emperor, for the Empress, for the safekeeping of Holy Archanea. In his heart, he adds another prayer he dare not speak aloud-- he prays this battle will not be necessary. Let the rebels find the mountains impassable, let them stay hemmed in at the borders of Menedy. He stops short of wishing them harm, but he wishes with all his being that they will not reach Adria Pass.

*

Roshea sleeps but briefly. It is not the clinging cold and damp that bothers him so much as it is a restlessness in his heart. He stares for some time at the roof of his tent, and sounds of the world waking around him keep his mind alert. Sticks crack, pebbles rattle, branches thrash with the sudden weight of birds and small scurrying creatures. Roshea gives up on sleep and emerges from his tent just before sunrise.

It is the hour of enchantment. The rosy touch of the dawn-goddess sets the snow of Adria Peak aglow, and its stark form now seems soft, like a blushing maiden instead of a forbidding old man. Roshea stares, and stares, and the color deepens with each passing second. He is too taken with the sight, and so forces himself to look away, to look around the humble camp and so bring himself back to reality. A cluster of tents, a low-burning fire tended by two sleepy-eyed soldiers, the whole scene redolent of horse... this is Roshea's world, but his eyes keep straying higher, to the mountaintops and the glorious blue of the sky. Such a terrible, terrible shame to despoil this place, to make it a scene of death and agony. He hopes the gods will not find a battle in their Gateway to be a damning transgression.

The touch of dawn upon the Peak is brief; soon the snows are a harsh white beneath the winter sun. White, too, is the layer of mist that blankets the valley below; it lingers through the first quarter of the day. When the mist dissolves, another illusion falls away. The rebel alliance has reached the valley and it moves along the snaking narrow trail like a dark river.

"They made good time," Vyland observes. "The captain didn't expect them until tomorrow."

Roshea says nothing. Their enemies will reach the pass well before nightfall; the battle is but hours away. The war may be won, or lost, before sunset dyes the snow with its brief play of color.

"He must be abusing the men to have them here so fast," Vyland adds. "Better luck for us."

Roshea is more afraid that he has been in years. This time, the enemy is not an unknown quantity, a phantom, a legend to be tested and proven false. Roshea knows his enemy. His mouth is dry because he _knows_ his enemy. He prays silently that Sedgar is right, and the rebel leader has become crazed in his ambition. A madman makes mistakes in keeping with his madness. If Marth of Altea is _sane_ despite his actions....

Roshea remembers the fall of the Sable Order. He can say that those knights were braggarts, say that it would take two of their best to equal any member of the Wolfguard, but he remembers how the Order was outwitted, outmaneuvered, and finally annihilated. He remembers, too, that the Archanean League sustained no fatal casualties in the course of that battle. It was a tactical masterpiece, one taught even now to the new members of the Wolfguard as a lesson in how war ought to be fought. And they are about to attack the commander who devised and executed that masterpiece-- Hardin's attentive student, who has now turned all that cleverness against his mentor.

Roshea has trouble keeping everything in perspective. The terrain around him forces him, at last, to see things as they are, and not as his fears would have them. He is, after all, staring down at rebel forces in miniature from the heights of a narrow mountain pass. This is not an assault on open ground; Captain Wolf has set up an ambush. From their position, invisible even to dragonknights, the Wolfguard hold the advantage. The rebels are marching directly into their trap, and it is entirely possible that they, the elite of Aurelis, can do what no other force has managed and at last stop this rebellion cold.

The captain comes over to gauge the rebels' progress, and he shows Roshea a smile.

"One well-placed arrow will end this," he says, and the promise is implicit in that rarely-seen smile. _Leave it to me_.

Roshea smiles back, hoping his fluttering nerves don't betray him. He is relieved to have the captain beside him, and even more relieved that the captain plans to take charge of their collective argument with the rebels. And yet, his stomach churns.

No one else seems uneasy. The newer members of the Wolfguard have the excuse that they have never lost a battle _and_ have never dealt with knights like those in the rebel alliance. But of the veterans of the War of Darkness, only Roshea is now at war within himself. Captain Wolf is confident. His aim will be true, and the mission is a guaranteed success. Vyland laughs, and speaks of how the former prince won't be so attractive to the ladies once his head is stuck above the gates of Millennium Court. Sedgar just shakes his head as he inspects each arrow of his quiver.

"We have to end this madness," he says, with a light in his eyes that, to Roshea, looks a little bit mad in itself. Roshea knows what most of the Wolfguard do not, that the lieutenant still grieves for a younger brother dead in the last war; to have a dark spell of grief take Sedgar now, with the rebel army so near, seems an ill omen. A knight should be in control of himself before battle, not the servant of uncontrolled emotions. If they were simply friends, Roshea would tell Sedgar to seek out a healer, but he cannot say this to his senior officer.

The rebels are now more than a dark mass of shadows in the road. Roshea sees clearly at least three dragonknights, and a pair of smaller shapes that must be pegasi. Beneath them, the main column of the army is slowly coming into focus. Roshea can see flashes of gold and of steel, bright bursts of color, and it would take only a little imagination to resolve these shapes and colors into familiar faces. At the head of the column floats the blue banner that has signaled terror to Archanean forces from the one coast to the other.

His mouth is dry yet again, and if he were _not_ a knight of Aurelis, not the youngest member of the Wolfguard, he would be tempted to reach for the apple brandy to soothe his jangled nerves. But Roshea is a paladin of Aurelis, and so he appeals instead to the heavens, that the gods will ensure that this battle is won by the righteous, that Archanea remains secure. But his heart continues to pound beneath his cuirass, and the rebels proceed step by step along the trail, heading inexorably for a collision with the Wolfguard and with Fate.

***

Author's Notes: No, this is not some jacked-up AU wherein Marth and his friends are the bad guys. This is what Wolf, Sedgar, and the rest _actually think _of Marth by the time Book Two of FE3 rolls around. Yes, the same guys who are on Marth's own team in FEDS. Sedgar in particular seems to view Marth as a Napoleonic scourge, a menace to the civilized world. I found it interesting that people who actually _knew _Marth could decide he was the Archanean equivalent of the Antichrist. Then again, these guys are taking orders from a man with glowing red eyes and apparently haven't noticed that something's gone a bit... funny... with Emperor Hardin.

This scene takes place right before Chapter 18 of Book Two of _Monshou no Nazo. _Very shortly Roshea's nerve is going to snap and he will plead with Wolf and the others to reconsider. No dice.

This does not take place in Aurelis, btw. It's called "Twilight of Aurelis" because it's the final moments of some of the greatest heroes Aurelis produced in the War of Darkness. These guys are about to meet the business end of a rapier (and possibly a Ridersbane, Aura spell, and so forth). Except, of course, for Roshea... but that's another story for another day. More notes to be posted on my DevArt journal.


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